Dear friends,
If ever there is a passage of the Bible that has caused controversy and division today, it is 1 Corinthians 6:9—11. There is not much doubt as to what the passage says or means, yet the application of this passage in the church and in society has led to great conflict. In today’s episode, Peter outlines something of the background of the conflict within the Anglican Communion over the last two decades, before we turn to the real pastoral importance of this passage in the lives of the leaders.
Yours,
Phillip
Phillip Jensen: Before we get into this week’s episode, we would like to encourage you to invite your friends and family members to subscribe so that we can share the news of 1 Corinthians to a wider audience.
Last week, we looked at 1 Corinthians 6:1–8 and discussed the question of disagreements between brothers that require reconciliation. But this week’s passage is quite stark. 1 Corinthians 6:9–11
Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
Peter Jensen: That is confronting, especially in the age of the Sexual Revolution, and also due to the power of the warning. In other words, if you continue to practice these things, you will be lost.
Phillip: It says twice that they “will not inherit the kingdom of God.” It’s hard to be more explicit than that. This is the passage that got Israel Folau, a Rugby Union footballer, into trouble. After he read and discussed the passage in his church, the Rugby Union cancelled his contract. I know there are disagreements about the basis on which they did it, but we all know, underneath it all, he was making a point here about entering the kingdom of God that people objected to, particularly the homosexual community. Similarly in Melbourne 2 years ago, Andrew Thorburn was appointed as the CEO of the Essendon Football Club, and the next day was forced to resign because years before, the church in which he was a member spoke on issues of sexual morality and marriage. The Essendon Football Club took objection to this, and so he was forced to resign. We have this difficulty in that a subject that 30 or 40 years ago could barely be mentioned has now been one of such widespread or powerfully spread promotion that you can’t even express a disagreement without at least chastisement. In the early 2000s, our federal government ruled that marriage was between a man and a woman; by 2017, the federal government ruled that marriage could be between people of the same sex. Now, if you speak against that, you are in trouble in the community, and may lose your job. But this passage deals with something greater than losing a football contract. These are very important subjects.
Peter: They are. First of all, here is a list of sins seen by Paul to be so grave that to live in accordance with them has dire consequences; you will not inherit the kingdom of God. It is a life and death matter which has had a vast impact on many places, but particularly on the worldwide Anglican church in the last 30 years.
The Anglican Communion, as it’s called, is not like Roman Catholicism. It’s more of a worldwide fellowship of independent denominations, depending on the country you’re in, which share the same history and much of the same theological basis, structure and liturgy. In its present form, it traces back to the Reformation. Central to the unity which has been maintained has been a fellowship with the Archbishop of Canterbury. He has been seen as the first amongst equals, so to speak, thus he has the capacity to call a conference called the Lambeth Conference every 10 years of all the bishops around the Anglican Communion.
Phillip: The Anglican Communion is a bit like the gathering of a very big extended family, in that all of the Anglicans have come out of England.
Peter: Yes, and when I travel around the world as an ordained person, my ministry is largely accepted. So when I lived in England for three-and-a-half years, I was allowed to minister. There are applications of this that are not insignificant; for example, there’s the way in which the churches in more wealthy countries try to look after those in poorer countries with financial support and with personnel. It’s not simply that once every 10 years, the bishops get together in communion. As you pointed out, we also have a shared history, and so what goes on in England is still particularly important to us.
Phillip: I remember the Lambeth Conference in 1998 when the Sydney bishops returned delighted that the conference had rightly and overwhelmingly decided that same-sex relations were inconsistent with the Scriptures and were not to be accepted within the Anglican Church.
Peter: I also remember them coming back, and partly because their advice and wisdom had been part of creating the document that spelled this out. Yet within five years or less, some Canadians and particularly the United States Anglicans, who are called Episcopalians, had gone ahead to bless same-sex relations despite what the Lambeth Conference had said. The Lambeth Conference is not a legal entity, so it does not make laws, but it was overwhelmingly in favour of supporting the traditional view of sexuality.
With some difficulty up until then, the Communion had stayed together over the advent of female clergy. This was also a fairly disputed subject which caused division, but people stayed together because that was not a matter of life and death. I have dear women friends who have been ordained. I don’t think they’ve lost their salvation as a result, although I do disagree with them. But as we can see from this passage, the practice of same-sex relationships and other sinful relationships put you outside the kingdom of God. It threatens your eternal salvation, which makes it very significant.
Phillip: Before we look at the significance in this passage, we should continue talking about the Anglicans for a while. How did the Orthodox Episcopalians—the ones who believed in the Scriptures—respond to the acceptance of same-sex marriage?
Peter: About 100,000 Episcopalians decided that they could no longer stay in their denomination with a clear conscience, so they withdrew. They lost many of their buildings as they did so, but they preferred to bear such losses over staying in a denomination which had made this decision, which to their mind went against the teaching of God’s Word. Subsequently, the same thing has happened in New Zealand, in Brazil, in Wales, in Scotland, and other places.
Phillip: What happened with the property issues?
Peter: Most of the court rulings went against the leavers, and so they lost their property. I remember one minister telling me that he and his whole congregation had left their building. I saw this building once; it was magnificent. But this large congregation left to meet in the local school, and some years later, they built a new building.
Phillip: That’s hard because often, the building is paid for by the congregation, not the denomination.
Peter: Leaving a building can be heart-rending for that reason, but also because the building is where members of the congregation were married, or where funeral services took place. Nonetheless, people sacrificed for the sake of the Word of God. In fact, the minister said to me that he never felt more free than when he left and was able to preach the whole Word of God without it being damaged by others.
In the following 5 years after these congregations left, there were many efforts all around the Anglican Communion to get the Americans and the Canadians to repent, but they refused to do so. So when the next Lambeth Conference was held in 2008, the then Archbishop of Canterbury had an impossible decision to make on whether or not he would invite the whole of the bishops of the Episcopal Church who had agreed to this. He decided to invite them, and so a large group of us decided that we could not attend the conference, so we set up our own conference in Jerusalem called GAFCON. It was at this conference that we took the key step of disassociating ourselves from the offending churches as we saw them, and recognising those who are left as the true Anglicans. GAFCON recognised their Anglican authenticity, which the successive archbishops have never been able to bring themselves to do.
Phillip: It raises the question of what it means to be Anglican. Is my Anglicanism just a matter of birth, or is it a matter of confession? Is every Englishman a member of the Church of England, or only those who believe in the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ?
But first, can you tell me what GAFCON stands for?
Peter: GAFCON stands for the Global Anglican Fellowship Conference. But of course, this conference has now turned into a movement.
Phillip: What are the achievements of these last 20 years of GAFCON?
Peter: There are many, but the one that I think is most significant is that, when the true Anglicans had to leave their churches for conscience’s sake and at some sacrifice, GAFCON helped them to start their own Anglican churches. In other words, the real heart of GAFCON is fellowship and communion. Not having fellowship with those who have disobeyed the Bible on a clear and vital matter, but having fellowship with those who have obeyed it. Essentially, this demonstrates that the authority of scripture is preeminent.
Phillip: The genuine Anglicans are not cradle Anglicans, but confessional Anglicans. So GAFCON was born and goes on to this day.
There is a new Archbishop of Canterbury, however, and she has made it clear that homosexual practices and partnership has her support. What does that do for the crisis that’s been happening for the last 20 years?
Peter: In the past, we have called the Archbishop of Canterbury “he”, which has been the case for the last 104 of them, but now we call her “she”.
Phillip: Does that make a difference at this point?
Peter: The Anglican Communion before 1998 had women priests and had women bishops shortly thereafter. Though this created tensions, it didn’t break the Communion because it wasn’t, in that sense, a salvation issue. But the advent of the new Archbishop of Canterbury, who has made it clear that she is in favour of homosexual practices, has made a difference. The Church of England has not gone down this path as yet, although it’s been debating it in its synod. Perhaps it never will, because there’s a fair bit of objection to it, but there are also a large number of people agitating for it. I’ve discussed this at length to illustrate the sheer importance of the disagreements, which we call “salvation issues”: issues which put at risk your inheritance in the kingdom of God. It means that there are moments when we need to stand back from fellowship and call for repentance. It’s not that we’ve washed our hands of the Americans; it is that we long for them to turn back and adopt the biblical teaching once more.
Phillip: Just to be clear, we do have strong disagreements, for example, about a woman Archbishop of Canterbury, but GAFCON is not separating from Anglicanism or maintaining that Anglicanism is separated from us because of the female Archbishop. I’ve seen that idea in secular media, but it’s not true.
Peter: It is to do with the stand she has made on this key subject. Though it’s not necessarily a helpful phrase, this is what I call a salvation issue.
Phillip: However, having ordination of women and consecration of women as bishops has created enormous strains in how we operate together. It’s not like that’s nothing.
Peter: No, it’s not. As I said before, one of the features of the Anglican Communion has been that I can go to England, to Africa, to South America and be with my fellow Anglicans. The fact that I’m an authentic minister is recognised in those places. But now, because of the disagreement based on our understanding of Scripture, since the ‘80s and ‘90s there has been a tension in the Anglican Church of Australia. Certainly, the appointment of a woman Archbishop in Canterbury does create its own tension. For example, the Nigerian Church, which is the largest group of Anglicans in the world, do not agree with this. So if the Archbishop of Canterbury visits Nigeria, will she be able to conduct Holy Communion? How will she be recognised with respect to her office, but also with the desire to keep the teaching of God’s Word?
Phillip: We no longer have mutually acceptable orders. But given the explicit nature of 1 Corinthians 6, the issue of homosexuality is in the list of things that prevent you from being in the kingdom of heaven.
But the first thing to notice about this list is the word “deceived”. Sin fools us. We’re all fools at different times, but it’s sin which fools us. We’re warned by the Apostle that there are certain sins that have this deceptive quality. In Galatians 5:21, where he talks about the works of the flesh, he says, “I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.”
Additionally, in Ephesians 5:6, he says, “Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.” So these sinful things have a deceptive quality that lead people to accept them.
Peter: Why is that the case if they are fairly obviously sinful?
Phillip: Firstly, we fool ourselves into thinking that God’s grace is expressed in freedom from sin: that he will forgive anything and everything at all times. That’s a very poor understanding of the love of God which removes the turning aside of God’s wrath through the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, as well as the repentance.
Secondly, so sinful are our hearts that we are very good at making exceptions and excuses for ourselves, finding a reason why God wouldn’t possibly condemn us: “What I’m doing is just natural to me because of the situation I’m in.” Therefore we can excuse almost anything. I’ve had friends excuse their adultery to me. They tell me that given how their wife had treated them, it’s not their fault that the girl in the office was now attractive to them. “It’s not really adultery because the marriage had dried up anyway,” they say.
Thirdly, the world is constantly telling me that sin is okay, and we succumb to the voice of Satan that is expressed in this world. In movies today, there is an acceptance of certain sexual immorality and of drunkenness. The world is not saying that if you do these things, you will be excluded from the kingdom of God; it is denying these very things. Sinful as the list looks, it’s fascinating how easily we’re deceived.
Peter: Indeed, and it’s important to underscore this because the discussion we’ve just had about GAFCON, which happens to be centred on one of the sins mentioned in the passage, may make it feel as though sexual immorality is what this is all about, and the Bible is denouncing this as the worst of all possible sins. But this passage is certainly not just about sexual sins.
Phillip: The list goes: the sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers, men who practice homosexuality, thieves, greedy, drunkards, revilers, and swindlers. There’s no hierarchy of sins. We mustn’t try and downplay it as if homosexuality is not in this list, but so is adultery, greediness, the love of money, drunkenness, swindling, and slandering. These, too, are sins that would exclude one from the kingdom of heaven. It is important to notice that it is about more than just sexual sins that we’re talking about, while at the same time not using that to downplay or exclude sexual sins. It is also important to notice that it is about committing these sins repeatedly. It’s not that you are excluded from the kingdom of heaven if you commit these sins once; it’s about being habitual, because he goes on to say, “Such were some of you.” It’s not talking about being drunk once, but about being a drunkard. It’s not talking about being greedy once, but about being a greedy person. It’s the very lifestyle of it.
Peter: There are many people caught up in this. Now, it may be that you are tempted by alcohol, but that doesn’t make you an alcoholic. But we’ve got to recognise that there are temptations to sin which arise from the heart, from the way we are. We need to be sympathetic to people in that situation and encourage them not to capitulate to a lifestyle which will only damage them and others.
Phillip: Yes. I’ve spent many years working with alcoholic friends and helping them, as Christians, out of what I see as an addiction. That is, there are certain sins that, when practiced enough, become addictive. They change the synapses of your brain to make it a difficult thing for you to renounce. Whereas some people can drink without ever getting tempted to be drunk, there are some people who, as soon as they start drinking, can’t help but get drunk. They’re different in those situations. The Bible doesn’t speak against drinking alcohol (I say that as a teetotaller myself) but it is speaking against those who drink and get drunk. Getting drunk is not of the kingdom of God. If that is your continued practice, then you should stop it, because you can’t be a drunkard and a member of the kingdom of God. However, if you’ve reached the third stage that I mentioned a few moments ago, namely becoming an alcoholic, not getting drunk becomes an almost impossibility. My alcoholic friends get tremors when they haven’t drunk. It’s physiologically an addictive practice that requires considerable help. And help is available, both in counselling or through Alcoholics Anonymous or Overcomers Outreach. Just because you may have this addictive characteristic to a particular sin, that does not mean you must and will always be there. Now, my alcoholic friends will never say they’re cured. The alcoholic always says, “I’m in recovery,” because he knows that should he lapse, he will lapse hard. So they are in recovery, but they are forgiven by Jesus Christ. They are no longer drunkards. They’re alcoholics because they’re addicted, but they’re not drunkards because they don’t get drunk anymore.
Peter: So there is hope. There is a way back.
Phillip: That’s true in the homosexual world too. Though people may have tendencies; I won’t go into the reasons why, because there’s considerable disagreement on this. Practising homosexuality is a different thing. There are many Christians who have same-sex attraction for various reasons, but who do not practice homosexuality. A few weeks ago in Malta, a man called Matthew Grech was finally declared to be not guilty of breaking the law. He gave testimony to his conversion out of the gay lifestyle into Christianity, but was accused of promoting gay conversion. Three years of court cases have finally settled that he was not guilty of such a thing by declaring that he has changed. Many people say that you can’t change, but he has demonstrated that you can, as many others have as well. Whether he continues to be attracted to men or not, he is no longer practicing. That’s the point: that the gospel has changed his life, and in the same way that my alcoholic friends love the Lord Jesus Christ and are no longer drunkards. But sadly, you also see people who are drunkards and who think it doesn’t matter, that it’s fun. You cannot have that; repentance and faith has to be serious. So you’ll notice the change, “And such were some of you.” That is the path of forgiveness and justification of adoption.
Peter: But what if a professing Christian falls away?
Phillip: Think back to where we started in chapter 5. There was a man who was practicing incest—he had his father’s wife as his sexual partner. The church was to take action in order to save him. There’s always a way back through the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ has paid for our sins, past, present, and future. But the way back starts with repentance. It involves turning to the Lord and leaving the sin behind. You can’t keep practicing the sin, because repentance is about turning back. It’s not simply remorse. The question is, are you turning away from that and finding the forgiveness that is in Jesus?
Peter: This has been an interesting and difficult conversation. But some of our listeners, I’m sure, may well be those who have found a habitual temptation arising perhaps from their personalities. What advice do you give?
Phillip: Firstly, all Christians are habitually tempted, so there’s nothing new or different about you.
Secondly, don’t try and solve the problem by washing away the idea that sin is sin. Don’t try and rationalise out of it. Recognise sin for what sin is, and recognise the dangerous grip that it can have on us, and worse, the exclusion from the kingdom of God. But recognising the power of Satan and his lies must be matched with a recognition of the far greater power of the forgiveness that comes through the death of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. And recognise that by his resurrection, the work of the Spirit is in our lives to bring us to repentance, change, and transformation.
So recognise that the sin is wrong. Turn to God and plead for the mercy that is available to us all in the death of Jesus. Ask for the power of the Spirit to work in bringing about the change. The fellowship of Christians is really helpful, for as we confess our sins to one another, we can encourage and build each other up in the gospel of the Lord Jesus.
Seek help, and do not accept the hopelessness that Satan will try and tempt you to believe.
Scripture quotations are from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Links & Recommendations
For more on this topic, listen to this talk given at Moore Theological College chapel entitled Israel Folau has Caused a Controversy in Australia.
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